Master Tigress's Dowry
by Zamael
Summary: When his daughter, adopted or otherwise, is preparing to get married, Master Shifu would so have wished that his greatest challenge would have been the seating order, or perhaps preparing a speech for the young couple. But nooo...
1. How the Whole Mess Started

Cold.

That was his first thought when he came to, his mind at least halfway functional once more. It was so very cold. The ground under his hand felt frozen as he tried to push himself upright, to continue the battle, to survive. Howling winds passed through him and pierced into the marrow of his old bones, feeding on whatever remained of his will to go on, to fight, threatening to have him fall back down and not get up again. His head ached, everything his eyes saw was blur, no matter how he tried to concentrate on the moving shapes around him. A voice echoed through his ears, like it came from somewhere far away. It felt vaguely familiar, though he could not really concentrate on exactly who it sounded like, and had an alarmed, warning sound: "Master!"

He managed to turn his head to his right, upwards from the floor, and saw the swiftly approaching shape of a vast stone hammer, aimed at his head. Who wielded that hammer, he could not see from all the blur, nor could he entirely remember either. But he did remember something clearly, nonetheless: _why _he was here, and _who_ it was that he was here for. If there had been the time for it, if the hammer would have come a second or two later, he would have groaned in deep exasperation and annoyance.

The things he did for his daughter...

* * *

><p>It was warm up at the Wu Dan Mountains - not at the highest peaks, of course, but still fairly far up. The time was a very late spring, after all, the nature preparing on their own part for the approaching summer, the grass growing high, the what few trees there were blossoming full of flowers: as was the relatively common knowledge, summer tends to be fairly warm. The setting sun was still helping on that part, a little, though not quite as much as it had only a few hours ago, and as such the evening was coming in, setting in a little bit of a chilly objection to the warmer weather, which it clearly saw as objectionable humbug.<p>

This did not seem to bother the two travelers up in the peaks at all. They walked on in a generally bright mood, in spite of the sun heading off and the coming cold and darkness, seeming to enjoy the coming green of the nature and each other's presence. The larger of the two was particularly jovial, chattering about idle things as he marched on ahead, whereas the smaller, albeit still a very tall and intimidating individual by nearly any standards, seemed a little bit confused but regardless optimistic. "I know you like to seem all mysterious and romantic and the sort," she said, "but could you at least say where we're going? It isn't the Sacred Pool of Tears, or we would have turned left several miles ago... which leaves me without a clue."

"Are you kidding me? You mean you've never been elsewhere at the mountains except at the Sacred Tears?", the other responded, incredulous.

"Of course I have. I used to hike across the entire mountains at winter: the snow would come to my waist, I would feel all frozen, but it helped to make me strong. This is all a good place for hiking and training, but I've never seen anything else remarkable anywhere here." The female tiger stopped as she saw the way her companion was looking at her, like she had just said kung fu was "pretty okay but nothing to get all freaked out about," or something else equally weird. "What?"

"Do you ever even look around yourself while you train?"

Tigress shrugged. "I watch my next step and remain wary of bandits."

"Yeah, but besides that! Things like trees and nature and, and mountain views! Did you ever, you know, relax? Take break out of all the kung fu stuff."

"Not until very recently," she shook her head... then looked directly at him, and smiled. "And thanks for that, Po. Really."

The panda smiled in turn, putting one large hand around her shoulders to pull her a little closer. "Well, that's also why we're here: gonna have to help you wind down. From all the hard, you know, kung fu stuff."

The sun had already set in its entirety, leaving their surroundings darker though still fairly well illuminated, by the time the two stopped at a cliffside. Tigress had been here before: besides the training runs already mentioned, she had often come up here to meditate, to help with her style, form and technique, and such things. It was a calm, serene place, where she was not hardly ever interrupted, thus perfect for her purposes. Why Po was taking her here puzzled her: what could he see there that she had not?

"...What am I looking at here?"

"All right," he nodded determinedly. "You're not here to do kung fu, or to train, or to run, or to do whatever else stuff you normally do. You just walked here 'cuz you felt like it. Walk. Not run. You're not even tired! With me so far?"

She nodded. He nodded as well, and smirked. "Great. Now look around you."

"What?"

"Just look."

She did. Tigress looked down the cliff to the Valley of Peace far away, to their home village, thousands of town lights betraying its location even in the otherwise utter blackness that the land was far over there. And above it, she saw the cloudless sky, the full moon and the countless number of stars, the constellations whose names she had never bothered to learn. And she looked around her, where the moon cast a silvery hue to their surroundings, particularly Po, who was smiling at her and looking like a glowing silver-black creature of some legend or another. This had all been here all along, for all those years she had chosen to train here - well, the panda was new, but still. She gasped.

"Yeah," he said, nodding. "I found this place back when Shifu and I trained here. Often came here to check out the sights. Nice, huh?"

"How could I have missed all this?", she whispered, confounded.

"Because you were too busy learning to kick better. Not that that isn't incredibly cool, but... yeah, you should've maybe stopped and looked around a couple times, right?"

Tigress was forced to concur with him on that part. She found the place where she usually meditated and sat down - not in a lotus position, not preparing to try and find peace, but simply sitting and watching the sky. This was all an entirely new experience for her: much of her life had been dedicated to kung fu, to improving herself, with very little time for idleness. And then Po had showed up to her life and had taught her to, well, "chill". Just sit on the Palace stairs, holding hands. Take an idle walk in the city, without running or practicing or anything else like that. Watch the night sky up in the mountains... it was still all a little strange for her, but evoked this tingling in her chest she had never felt before - and, right now, in her back and shoulders as well.

It took her a little while to realize that this was, in fact, something Po was more directly responsible of, rather than simply her confused feelings about the situation. "Po, what are you doing?" She tried to turn her head to watch.

"What do you think I'm doing? I'm trying to give you a back massage," came the slightly strained response. "Y'know, help you relax a little more... except it's really hard because your muscles are like steel."

"Thank you."

"Yeah it's cool and all, but right now it wasn't a compliment. Makes it ridiculously hard to... uh, do you think you could, I dunno, relax your shoulders a little? To let me work on this..."

She tried. This was another thing the feline was incredibly unfamiliar with, but with the help of Po's fingers working on her, she thought she managed somewhat. She knew this had happened because, all of sudden, a massive jolt of pain struck through all her back muscles and made her flinch and tense once more. "Ow! Watch it."

"Sorry, sorry, it's just... you really ARE pretty strained. Come on, now you went all tense again, it won't hurt that bad the second time around."

And upon convincing her to relax once more, she found that he was right. It did still hurt, yes, but it was the good sort of pain: his paws helping the blood flow and reveal vast amounts of packed-up stress and tension, the sort of feelings she had not known for years, yet was suddenly aware they had been there all along. It felt warm and rather pleasant, too, and she began to purr as he took a better position behind her, sitting on his lap and letting him gradually get lower...

Neither was entirely sure at which point her vest had been discarded entirely, casually tossed to the side like it was but a useless piece of rag. Lying on her back, in the grass, Tigress closed her eyes and let Po get back to work: he felt somewhat more hesitant this time around, and much more careful with his touches, and occasional kisses, even though she encouraged him on by wrapping her arms around his head and pulling him close, giving an occasional faint whimper whenever he found a really good place to focus on. delights and treasures of her own physical shell that even _she_ was completely unaware of ever existing!

"Mmm...", she moaned. "It feels like I'm a stranger to my own body..."

"That's really weird," he murmured from somewhere down below, around her stomach, fingers feeling her sides. "Didn't you ever, you know, explo-" He stopped when he evoked an entirely new reaction from her, the paws having found a ticklish spot that made her arch up from the ground and, to her vast shame, giggle. "Did you just laugh?"

"No, Po, don't be... ridiculous..." He tried again, but this time she was ready and managed to stifle the laughter to her throat, turning it into a sort of a "Morffrr..."

"You did!" Po laughed in triumph. "I found a tickey spot. You bet I'm going to remember this for later..." She pushed his face against her stomach to silence him, and he took the cue and kept going, both relaxing once again to simply live in the moment...

...Until a single finger of his reached under her pants and gave a little tug, causing her to gasp and shrudder powerfully. He immediately stopped and looked up, his face apologetic. "Oh, sorry. Uh. That's not okay with you? I can see why it wouldn't, I guess I just got carried away a tad..." She was panting heavily, and feeling hot, in spite of the night chill around them - which, frankly, had been forgotten a long time ago. They might as well have been up in the clouds.

"So, um..." He had backed away a little from her, looking ashamed, and to be honest, rather cute. "...Yeah. Maybe we should just..."

She made her decision in the split second he was silent, and gave him no opportunity to finish what he might have been wanting to say. Instead, she leapt up from the ground, threw her arms around the neck of the now very confused-looking panda, and rolled him back to the ground with herself on top, kissing him deep.

At first Po thought this was a truly odd turn of events, but once he got used to the female tiger hugging him and making out on him, he managed to respond in kind, pulling her closer from the waist, and reciprocating to the kiss, eliciting a happy growl from her. He felt all the more puzzled about the things, butterflies starting up fierce hurricanes in his vast belly, when he saw her pull back, and grin mischievously. He felt the wind around him rather colder, all of sudden, and when she lifted her paw for him to see, he instantly realized why.

"Oh, okay..." He chuckled at her sudden forwardness, as his pants were also tossed away to the grass, outright removing them from the entire existence which seemed to consist of only them two. She descended back upon him to pepper his neck and shoulders with more kisses, repaying some of the affections he had done to her but a moment ago, as his exploring paws picked up some courage and went lower on her back, ending up stroking her tail up and down, feeling it swish around and hearing her purr. All the lower they went, and found-

_Pain._ "Ow!"

In the land full of pleasure and comfort, the sudden jolt of sharp and intense agony on Po's fingers was a violent awakening and a thrust back into harsh reality. Even while he was still trying to discern what had just happened, both his and Tigress's personal universes having briefly consisted only of each other, he saw the long wooden staff leaving the surface of his fingers and placing itself firmly between the two of them, swiftly moving away from him, effortlessly taking the female along with it and shoving them apart. And as he sat up and looked at who had so rudely disturbed them, his anger and frustration were swiftly flushed away and replaced with dread, all colour disappearing from his face and his heart leaping back to his throat, grabbing tight and refusing to come down.

"Ohshh- uh..." His hand fumbled behind him and found a fabric, bringing it in front to cover himself - only to find that instead of his pants, he had found her vest, which she swiftly took away from him and replaced with his own cloth. Tigress dressed up in a hurry and silence, clearly embarrassed and flushed red: Po fumbled with explanations and excuses - "This isn't what it looks l-... uh... you wouldn't believe what happened...", and so forth - even as he tried to get his pants back on, both activities made significantly more difficult by his thoughts, which pretty much went _I'm so dead_.

Master Shifu was of almost serene peace, yet the presence of the tiny red panda towered over the two much larger ones there, only a very occasional twitch of an eye betraying the anger that was bubbling beneath the calm exterior, threatening to erupt at any moment. He remained quite silent, simply observing them dressing up and standing again, hearing the panda's clumsy account on the turn of events: indeed, he reminded Po of the time when they had first met, only this time he had done something so much worse than breaking a priceless urn.

"...Not the Wuxi Finger Hold...!", he finally whimpered, finishing with the sputter of explanation and hiding his fingers behind his back. "Master, I-", Tigress attempted, but their mutual master raised a hand in such a manner that she quieted down in an instant - which, considering how easily she could shut up anyone else, was a fair feat. He waited until both were perfectly silent, dressed, standing up, and giving him their full attention, before he at last spoke:

"Panda, you do of course understand that as a dutiful father, I feel certain disinclinations about letting anyone at all do anything more physical than dancing with my daughter. You may nod now. Or shake your head, if you feel giving up your life early."

He nodded frantically, and the smaller panda continued. "When I see her, she is still the same cub I picked up from the orphanage no less than twenty years ago, and in spite of her grueling training and having become a true kung fu master I can be proud of, there is a part of her left that can still be hurt, and that you have begun to uncover." He smiled and paused.

Had he not been terrified over his own life, Po would have kindly said that he understood, that the other one could now get to the main point, but since he was in fact terrified over his own life, all he managed was another nod. Tigress opened her mouth but was once again stopped by the raising hand. The old master took a long, deep breath, pausing for a little longer before continuing again, sounding all the more stern:

"Can I entrust her to your care and know for sure that she will never be hurt?"

"Er..."

"Think _carefully_ before you answer."

"Master, what're y-" The hand stopped her. Shifu did not even look to her direction anymore, a calmly lifted palm all it took to silence her for the third time. And finally, after a few grueling seconds of silence, the panda nodded: it was rather doubtful he had thought it through as much as his master may have wished, this being Po they were talking about, but it was good enough for him.

"Tigress, do you have any problem with this whatsoever?" He now turned to look directly at his adoptive daughter. "I have gotten the impression that you are rather fond of him."

"Uh..." She nodded. "No. No problems at all." Her mouth kept open a little longer, as if she was going to add something else, but she decided against it. Shifu seemed satisfied regardless.

"Very good!" For the first time during the encounter, he managed something of a smile, and Po could feel his heart sink back to its original position, feeling relatively relieved. "You should go to your father for the night, Po, to inform him of the matter and prepare himself: Tigress and I will come over to settle everything with you and him first thing tomorrow, in order to make sure he has nothing against the union (though I doubt it) and that all his wishes, as the groom's father, will be noted of. The ceremony can be held in the courtyard within two weeks, or a month at most, barring any special circumstances that might prolong it: until then, I would greatly appreciate it if you could keep your hands to yourselves."

He bowed at them, and the other two, their minds still trying to digest what had been said, bowed back instinctively, after which the little master turned and started to leave, only to turn back one last time to smile widely. "Congratulations on your betrothal: this will be a cause of celebration for us all! And Po, if you do betray me after all, and it turns out I could not have trusted you, you will _wish_ I would have used the Wuxi Finger Hold."

And then, at last, he left, leaning at the staff as he walked back to the road and leisurely took off towards the Jade Palace, leaving behind two very confused young lovers.

"W-..." Po stopped, collected his thoughts, then continued again. "What just happened?" Tigress just shrugged, managing not a word.

* * *

><p>And so the morning after, a couple hours before the opening time of the Dragon Warrior, saw a fairly informal meeting between the four people involved right at the center of this entire event. Tigress was shifting her feet awkwardly and sort of avoiding eye contact with him as Shifu walked to the restaurant with her, staying behind him throughout the journey as if she could somehow hide her entire body behind a two-foot-tall red panda.<p>

Po was making a similar attempt, as they soon saw, standing behind his father and trying to look inconspicuous, though still managing a short smile for his bride, to which she responded in kind. Mr. Ping, in turn, seemed to be in a quite cheerful mood, happily showing the two guests inside - and giving a critical eye at the feline as she came in, appraising her from head to toes, frowning briefly before returning to his smile once again. "So, this is the lucky lady, yes? So very nice to meet you: Po has told me everything about you!"

"We have met before," Tigress corrected him with a small smile and a bow. "Several times."

"Oh of course, of course, but back then you were not a to-be daughter-in-law!", the goose exclaimed jovially. "It quite changes our relationships, doesn't it? Now, who wants some noodles? Tofu, perhaps? I'm not sure you have had breakfast yet! Only half price for my new family... or, make that two thirds..."

All in all, the meeting was relatively (and thankfully, two of the four would say) brief. The two older men spent a few moments discussing about matters such as the exact date and place, with Mr. Ping seeming quite keen to be involved in most of the details of the arrangement - "Well, at least as much as I can afford from my job!" - with the young couple spending most of the time entirely quiet, slowly fading to the background and missing out much of the discussion: if they were asked something, usually whether they were okay with the date of the ceremony or such, they snapped into it and answered briefly that yeah, it's fine with them. Awkwardness and embarrasment slowly gave away into a bit of giddiness and even some smiles, as they gradually got more and more used to the idea of being married.

And then along came the question that would start up so much trouble for master Shifu, the pebble that gave way to the avalanche. The one that asked it was Mr. Ping: "So, when can I expect the dowry?"

Shifu opened his mouth, but it was Po that got there first, having evidently been expecting this: "Dad, I told you, it's the Jade Palace. It's all about learning and enlightenment: not exactly the sort of a place that'd store huge piles of gold in their basement for some reason."

The Jade Palace master nodded in agreement. "We have very little in terms of material wealth. Any profit we might have comes from donations, most of which goes to maintaining the Palace, besides with there really is nothing else except the artifacts at the Sacred Hall of..."

"Are they worth a lot?", Ping interrupted with a glint in his eye.

"Dad, you can't be serious," Po groaned, his face buried in his hands and looking deeply ashamed. Shifu picked it up from there, with "Their value cannot be estimated by any monetary amount. Giving them up is out of the question."

"Well, we do have to adhere to traditions!", the goose stated matter-of-factly. "And I have a shop to take care of, with no heirs, and my son leaving me all alone..." Po tried to start something but was shushed silent. "...So who will take care of me when I am too old to work...?"

The panda just gave a meaningful look at Tigress and Shifu, the latter of whom continued: "We will arrange something, Mr. Ping, don't worry about that. Traditions are important, after all.

The entire discussion managed to dampen the mood slightly, what with both sides of the couple thinking this whole thing had been a somewhat unromantic subject, but things picked up again once they all got to taste some of Mr. Ping's famous soup (with the secret ingredient!), which tends to have the side effect of easing moods and cheering people up. Through the stomach and all that.

Afterwards somebody suggested Suang Ming, or telling the fortune of the couple from their birthdates, but since nobody had any idea exactly when either one of them had actually been born, the idea was quietly buried. The meeting was ended a few minutes before the shop would open, and Po chose to leave back to the palace with the others, apologising them about his father. "You know he can be a little like that sometimes."

He cheered up considerably when Tigress took his hand to hers, and they walked that way, smiling, all the way to the Temple.

* * *

><p>Shifu slept little that night, studying the scrolls.<p>

Talking with the rest of the Five had produced very little results. None of them had many better ideas than simply asking for more donations: "Many here would love to chip in to the dowry of someone like Tigress!", Mantis had said. "She's helped out everyone a lot."

Shifu had shot down the suggestion on the grounds that they were already almost entirely dependant on them, and that they had to ask some more to be able to afford the wedding anyway, even with Mr. Ping paying some of it. "Besides," he had added, "this is a gift, not just a pile of money I got from people that have nothing to do with it. It should at least be something I went through some trouble for."

No. He had to find another way to gather some extra gold. Which is why he was now spending so much time with the scrolls, in particular the old legends and maps. He had not read many of these since he was young, but he remembered many he had been very fascinated about, back when he was spry and adventurous: he had even made some expeditions of his own, and although each had taught him many things of life and were probably not entirely for naught, each had also come short of the ultimate objective.

Perhaps it was the time for another one... he opened one particularly interesting scroll, read its story and its supposed location, what was told to be within, how it was defended, and decided that it would probably do fine enough. It would be dangerous, yes, possibly deadly, but what was there he would not do for his daughter?

Though he slept little that night, what little sleep he did get was quite peaceful.

* * *

><p>The next morning, Shifu was gone. His students did not find him in his quarters, not in the training hall, nor in the Dragon Grotto. But what they did find was a short message, left in Master Crane's room for him to find:<p>

_I have left on the account of a slight matter I must take care of personally. It is nothing you should worry yourselves about, and I should be back in a week or two. Continue defending the Valley to the best of your abilities, resume your training, and prepare for the wedding without me: you may ask Mr. Ping what he might need you for._

_-Shifu_

_P.S._

And they all groaned as he read it out loud for them, for they had been left a dangerous and annoying task indeed.


	2. A Trip to the North

_One hundred years after the arrival of Master Oogway and kung fu, China came under attack from a new threat hailing from the far north, beyond civilized lands where all who inhabited it were barbarians and demons. Thus it was an initial impression that the Great Zhanglian Khan, who came to plague and pillage the empire with his horse hordes, was in fact a demon, or at the very least an incredibly uncivilized person indeed: these days people know better, or at least the learned ones do, but it is still a generally accepted fact that the warlord was a capricious, impolite and self-served, and an otherwise incompetent ruler and general, and that the only reason he saw any success at all was China's own internal conflicts at the time, combined with kung fu being a relatively new art that had not yet spread very far, leaving very few to stand against him._

_Needless to say, these very few included among themselves Master Oogway and his students, the first two generations of kung fu practicioners. The raids and other conquest, initially relatively unopposed and storming through the known world, were suddenly and utterly pushed back at Wu Dan Mountains by an art completely unknown to these foreign devils, entire armies of horses being destroyed and thrown down the mountain by barely two dozen peaceful animals. The Khan himself, baffled by this display but unwilling to retreat from a mere handful, saw his death at the hands of Oogway (though the sage himself claimed it was done by the hands of one of his finest students), his body tossed down the ravine and never confirmed to have been found or recovered._

_This is all that the history books can tell us for certain. But there are persisting stories, legends and hearsay, claiming that the warlord had hidden beyond the mountains in his homeland, these days known as Mongolia, all the gold and treasure he had claimed for himself through his at first successful attacks. Depending on the exact story heard, it could contain literal mountains of riches, warriors sculpted out of stone to defend it, deadly and vicious traps, Zhanglian Khan's body that had indeed been salvaged in secret, a shriveled doll of Master Oogway, full of pin needles - and even what some tales claim to be the Greatest Treasure in the World, something the Khan had never, in all his travels and conquests, found any equal to._

_None of these can be verified, and no such vault has never been confirmed to exist or having been found. There have been many expeditions to the north, of course, both by the Chinese and the Mongols themselves, but all have returned empty-handed. Some scholars do claim that the Master Charging Rhino, who led a small group of students and scientists, -did- in fact discover the tomb: this estimation was made on the account that he was never seen again nor were any trace of him found, which, for those that knew anything of his skill and competence, obviously meant that the vault and its defenses had been the thing that got him._

_Perhaps the vault will indeed be found one day, but one should not hold their breath._

* * *

><p>The Great Wall of China in the far north marked the line between civilization and barbarism, where knowledge and rationality ended and through which only utter savagery could be found, where some of the finest warriors in the empire - and thus, in the world - were stationed and had to remain ever vigilant for hordes of wild horses, illegal immigrants, vandals seeking to harm or deface the Wall, and children armed with snowballs. None had ever escaped swift retribution and justice in the shape of rout, deportation, made to scrub off their inappropriate remarks of the Emperor, and notes handed to their mothers.<p>

Travellers heading _to_ Mongolia instead of _from_ it were, in comparison, much less common. Not many of the learned and mighty would wish to take a single step on the other side, but here the guards were presented a small, weak-looking red panda, who at first glance did not seem like the type to have any business in the land of the demons and other nasties. Eventually they just made him promise he wasn't up to no good and let him go, figuring they did not really want to know what he was doing there (as long as it wasn't conspiring against China) and that judging from his size and posture, he was probably a great kung fu master anyway, none of them very willing to try and stop one of those.

A couple had said he looked familiar. Like they knew him from somewhere else... "Someone famous. I can't remember from what, but he looked a mighty bit like this guy we had here."

Still preoccupied with this, none of them saw someone else pass by a couple hours later - but they would have had to be quite perceptive to see it in the first place.

* * *

><p>There was not much snow in the Mongolian plains: there usually was, oh so much more, but this was an early summer. This was the time the grass grew, all over the place, and as such the time when the grass farmers were at their busiest. It was a boring and thankless job, there being something to gather more or less absolutely everywhere, but if they did not take all this grass higher up to the mountains where it did not grow, to all those hungry horses who were just too poor to have anything better imported for themselves, then who did?<p>

And of course, there were bandits.

"That's a very nice cart of _delicious_ grass ye've got there, miss," said the apparent leader of the group of ne'er-do-wells, surrounding a rather nervous mare and her cart full of grass. "Ya don'ts mind if we take care of it from here on, would ya?" His tone was that of false friendliness and outright threatening.

"P-please, good sirs," she attempted to stutter diplomatically. "I spent the whole morning collecting this grass! It-it is going to my family up in the mountains." A small smile was managed, although it did not reach her eyes. "And besides, isn't there more than e-enough for us all...? Look around you, plenty of grass everywhere: you are _standing_ on so-"

She was rewarded with a strong, heavy hand grabbing her by the neck and pulling her closer, getting a terrified squeal from her. "Don't ya get smarts with me, lady!", the horse bandit growled. "Me and me folks come from the war with them southern prettyboys! We's far too important and great to _pick up_ our own grass!" With a malicious grin, and a chortle from his cronies, he tossed her away from her cart and down to the ground. "Don'ts worry, tho: if yer family's hungry, we'll sell 'em what's left for some good pri-"

"Is there a problem?"

Everybody present turned to look at the newcomer on the scene, a small creature in brown and green, a dark-brown cloak to cover himself from the weather, and a long wooden staff. He looked from the bandit to the bandits to the mare, and seemed to regard the scene with a calmness unfamiliar to the thugs.

"Ain't no problem here, lil' guy," was the answer, accompanied with a low laughter. "Unless ya wanna make trouble with us."

The response was one none of them expected. In their minds, any sensible person would mutter a negative response and hurry off before they would have the chance to hurt him. Indeed, any sensible person would not have asked about problems to begin with. And the small thing continued to surprise them: "Yes, actually, I do. You are a lazy, weak, stupid, and brutish bully who should be taught a lesson he won't soon forget. Do you disagree with this?" Under the hood, he smiled at them.

This fetched a low, guttural laughter of the entire bandit bunch - although exactly why they did so was a little less clear - as their leader took some steps until he stood right in front of the newcomer. "Oi, ya guys hear? This lil' feller here's got a deathwish on his plate! Maybe we oughta hurt him a little, teach him some respeEEAAAAAAA"

The smaller figure had barely moved, yet the forked end of his staff had briefly struck forward, painfully hitting both the horse boss's eyes at once and getting a scream of anger and agony out of him. He tried to back away, but the pronged end of the staff caught him from the back of his neck and pulled closer, forcing him into a face-first dive towards the assailant, who now thrusted forward with his left hand, resulting in a sickening crunch as two fingers broke his muzzle and simultaneously tossed him away by several feet, soon hitting the ground with a heavy thud. "Owwww, my dose... get 'im!", he managed to command his underlings, who did as was told, slightly intimidated by the performance but not enough to back away.

The innocent grass gatherer could but watch in amazement as the thugs tormenting her, five in all, were taken out in seconds with similarly little trouble. The harmless-looking creature moved with the speed of a lightning, its tiny fists and fingers striking with an unerring precision and yet having the force of a massive boulder behind them, and his staff becoming a blur in the air that seemed to be everywhere at once, much to the confusion and terror of the attackers. In a matter of few moments, all were down, groaning and holding various bits that had been hurt. He ignored them and moved on to her, helping her up and making sure she was all right: she could but nod.

"They will not bother you again," still smiling, the stranger said, looking back at the thugs: their leader was lying face-down on the ground, chewing on some grass and clearly wishing he was someplace else, with an unbroken nose at that.

"Oh, thank you so much! I don't know how I could ever repay-... would you like some grass?" She smiled as she offered him a handful.

"Oh... um, thank you for the offer, but I've only just eaten," was his response. His smile never left him, although his eyes looked a wee bit hesitant. He leaned on his staff as he took on walking once again, northwards, soon leaving her alone to the fields.

Mere minutes after he was gone, a fair bit away and above, another shape headed north.

* * *

><p>Up in the mountains it was far colder, and far more snow, but regardless warmer than most of the time, driving most of the inhabitants of Zhen Leng to their local inntavern, to escape the heat and the unusual lack of snow. The establishment was owned by an elderly Mongol named Crazy Horse, his mane greying but with eyes that betrayed a vast amount of elderly wisdom and cunning. It was just a small inn he had, but he had made it clear that he was very fond of the place, and did not abide brawlers.

Most listened. Those that did not, were unceremoniously tossed out.

Zhen Leng was a small town, residing a bit on the outskirts of the main roads, and independent on the goings of the rest of the country: rarely did anyone there need to leave the town for any reason, and rarer still would someone visit it.

This day was one of the rare exceptions. For it was on this day that the relative peace and calm of the only inn in town was interrupted, as a stranger walked in. Covered in a cloak, with an unusual and rather fragile body structure that clearly marked him as a foreigner, all eyes were on him as he walked at the counter where the old bartender was cleaning up a clay mug, in a way that suggested he would have preferred something else there, but that the times were not ready. "What'll it be?", he grunted unceremoniously, making no comment about the person's origins: a paying customer is a paying customer.

"Do you serve noodles here?", he asked.

Crazy Horse nodded, and the customer carried on: "Then, may I have a cup?" He paused. "...Make it two."

He picked himself a corner table at the end of the tavern, and soon got his order, the entire time having all eyes on his back. Still, no one had the reason to bother him, nor did they wish to pick fights here (the bartender had indeed been very adamant on this fact), so besides some muttering and an occasional glare, they left him alone.

A little later, this small guy with a long wooden staff showed up.

The mean looks and mutters raised up in frequency and octave with the second arrival: having one foreigner up here was odd enough as it is, but another in the same decade, let alone the same day, was extraoridinary indeed. Unlike the first stranger, who had only wished for a meal, the second one ended up in a longer chat with the old stallion, which, to the people observing, was clearly unusual.

"Long time no see," the horse said as he served some bean buns to the tiny stranger, who was clearly no stranger to him, although no one could hear what he was saying. "I never expected to see you up here, to be honest. What sort of business would you have at my humble establishment?"

"Why would I need to have any ulterior motives to see an old friend?", the guest responded mysteriously.

"So, you only wished to see me for the old times' sake?" The Crazy Horse did not sound convinced.

"Well, I did not say that."

He snorted. "Master Oogway's habits are getting into you. So, how may I help you, then?"

Under his cloak, Master Shifu smiled. "Wouldn't you like to exchange pleasantries first? How is your beautiful wife?"

"Dead," Crazy Horse responded somberly. "Three winters ago. She had just gotten too old."

"Oh. I am sorry to hear that: I didn't know."

"You needn't be. It was quite peaceful." He smiled. "So, what of Master Oogway? Or Tigress? I have not seen her since she was a cub: has she grown up well?"

"Indeed she has. That is, in fact, the very reason I am here: she is getting married in three weeks, and you are invited!"

"Really? That sounds wonderful... it has been a long while since we have had real a reason for celebration."

"Well, there was that whole Dragon Warrior thing, a while ago... I'm fairly sure you missed it."

"Oh." A silence fell between the two, still illuminated by all the red eyes all over.

The first stranger seemed interested of them as well. His cloak and the shadows hid his facial features fairly completely, but it did not hide the movements of the deeper shadow that was a person, and the movements of his head went left, towards the counter and the two old speakers. In other words, he did precisely what everybody else did: follow the little creature, watch him, observe him, but do nothing themselves. Finally, Crazy Horse spoke again:

"But you did not simply send a messenger to me: you came in person, and it was established you could use my help as well. So, how may I help you?"

Shifu chewed on his bean bun, looked around for the other patrons, his eyes briefly stopping at the other stranger, then speaking once more. "What do you know of the Galloping Canyon?"

* * *

><p>No one had heard what they had been talking about in the first place, but there was a point when the Crazy Horse got quite interested. He was rather old, and none of them had seen him do that in a while, as in several decades, but now, after sitting straight and looking around for a second, he leaned back in, even closer, and they lowered their voices some more. The horse and the weird little creature chatted away for some more time, the latter having a second helping of his food, before they parted ways, seeming pleased about the turn of events. The bartender went back behind his counter, serving more drinks (several were ordered), while the other one went busy finishing his plate, still quite undisturbe-<p>

"Oi."

Ah, there it was now. One of the many patrons, now having drunk enough for some confidence to go against the bartender's wrath, had sat down in the same table with the small stranger. He ignored him entirely and kept eating his bean buns, even when he was joined by half a dozen more, all sitting down or just standing around him. The other cloaked person, still hidden within the shadows and observing intently, was more or less ignored, having come earlier and not asking any questions.

The one that had first arrived eyed the still feeding, cloaked stranger. "So... what'd you and the old horse talk of?"

No response. The chewing of his bun could be heard intently.

"I mean," the other continued, "he never speaks much about anything. And we're his pals! We live here! And now you show up, with your fancy foreign things," he pointed at the foreigner's very foreign chest, receiving no reaction whatsoever, "and he opens up like a chattermouth, and you keep going for like, hours or what! So what was that all about? Who are you anyway?"

Still no response.

Clearly annoyed by this turn of events, he leaned in, lowering his head almost on the table and looking at the foreigner intently from no less than a foot away. "I see you like to chew," he began, then lifted his fist high. "Then maybe you should chew... on my FIST!" He slammed on the table, yet still the other one did not react - possibly because his mouth was full. He did raise his small hand, then hold up just one finger, and then he swallowed. And then he spoke:

"Hey, why the long faces?"

An ice-cold silence filled the common room of the inn. Slowly, two dozen pairs of eyes, gleaming red and furious, turned towards the corner table, at the hitherto ignored foreigner. The temperature fell by several degrees in mere seconds as their attentions fell entirely to the poor cloaked person that had just said one of the worst things one could say in a full Mongolian tavern. They decided to ignore the person they had been trying to torment so far, after all, instead walking over to the other one, who finally found his words, and said, meekly and with a very different voice indeed: "Hehe... that wasn't me who said that..." The two bowls in front of him were empty, or almost so: the final string of noodle in one of them was swiftly sucked into the stranger's chest, to a clear surprise of everybody watching - including the stranger himself.

It surprised them even more when something small and green suddenly erupted from the very same chest area. Likewise, right outside the inn, one mare in the middle of her daily chores got a bit of a scare when a horse crashed right through the wall, toppling down unconscious and leaving a sizeable hole behind him. Inside, everything remained surprisingly the same, with the exception that there was one Mongol less within, a great deal more light, and a small, green insect standing on the table, in a battle stance and looking at each of the remaining locals, as if daring them to attack.

The hooded stranger from which the bug had emerged was looking down at it. "...Mantis, have you ever considered, you know, _thinking_ before actually speaking?"

"Yes," the insect called Mantis responded, "but you have _no idea_ how long I have wanted to say that to a horde of Mongols. I saw an opportunity and caught it!" An opportunistic inn patron saw his chance here, with the opponent having turned his face around, to try and squash him against the table without fear of counterattack or other sort of retribution, only to find, to his dismay, pain, and swift unconsciousness, that he was wrong. His bravery was rewarded with being crashed against a table, and laying limp and motionless in its rubble.

If there was discord here before, now there was a pandemonium. Basically the entire contents of the inn attempted to simultaneously jump in a single small corner, only to be thrown back by the mantis, as well as the cloaked stranger, that had thrown his disguise away and kicked two more horses away with his thin avian legs. More fists tried to land at them, and hammers and spears were drawn to cause some more damage, but all attacks were relatively clumsy and sloppy: even if many were professional warriors, they could not be compared in the bird and the bug, who moved swiftly and fluidly, not a step mistepped, each movement clearly calculated.

Someone tried to hammer at the insect, but although his strike did go all the way through the table, smashing splintering wood to the floor, his victorious mood lasted precisely a second before his weapon was lifted from the ground, flipped around, and used to smash him in the face instead. Two others focused at the bird instead, and received a gust of wind powerful enough to throw them to the ground: the third coming from behind them was grabbed and picked up by two so-weak-looking legs, swung upwards, then tossed right through another wall, making one more hole to the now rather hole-y looking establishment.

A few more impressive battle feats, and the entire building fell into silence again, only broken by the murmurs of the people outside, having come to witness the event, and the north wall, which had been left with one large hole and several smaller ones, and which chose this as the opportune moment to collapse entirely. Master Shifu was standing on top of his staff, still holding the bowl and eating the last bun - his table had collapsed under the weight of two horse warriors - giving the two students of his a disapproving look. "What are you two doing here?"

"Well...", Crane began, walking to his master and bowing. "At first we were just going to wait for you, but then we saw the scroll on your table, the map missing from it, and put two and two together."

"We could not just let you go and risk your life all alone!", Mantis picked up. "It already claimed Master Charging Rhino, and who knows how many else. So, we thought that since Master Crane was the only one that could catch up with you, and I was the only one he could carry without slowing him down, the two of us should come along to back you up."

Crane nodded adamantly. "We couldn't let Master Tigress lose her father while she was being wed. That would have been awful!"

The red panda nodded, with a sarcastic smile, leaving the now empty bowl on top of an unconscious horse's head, then looking around. "Indeed, and look what you have already done: started a bar brawl!"

"Mantis did, not me!", Crane defended himself. "I'm sure he thought you were in danger: I did too." Mantis nodded at the words of his fellow warrior.

"I could have survived, certainly without... _this._"

Mantis bowed, looking apologetic - though perhaps not quite as much as Shifu would have hoped. "I apologise sincerely, Master, and I will accept any punishment you might have for me."

"And it would still be worth getting to call a roomful of Mongols 'long-faces'," Crane added with a mischievous grin.

"You bet!" The insect chuckled, then saw the face of his master, and stopped very quickly, with a very silent "Sorry."

Shifu was still smiling, no less sardonically, and pointed to his right. Looking there, the two students saw the last horse still standing in the inn. Indeed, the old bartender had not partaken in the battle at all, and was now looking at the two disapprovingly, though not really all that angrily, his arms folded over his chest. "Students of yours?", he asked Shifu.

"Indeed." The red panda nodded. "Students, meet Master Crazy Horse. We used to be friends in the days long past - though never all that good ones, I will admit, and he did not stay for a long time before moving on."

Crazy Horse nodded, then turned to look at the two students, a small smile slowly spreading to his lips. "May I?"

"Oh, by all means."

* * *

><p>"That went well," Crane said, completely deadpan, two miles after the village, and a fair bit higher up.<p>

The first two miles had gone entirely silent between the three. Master Crane was limping, one wing of his twisted in a strange way, both eyes black. Master Mantis was almost unconscious in his own master's arms, having no strength left to move himself around anymore. It was getting a little bit late, some snow fell down even though it was almost summer, and all in all the mood was rather sour.

"Of course, the payment for the damage you two caused will be taken from your share of the treasure," Shifu finally opened his mouth. "We should still reach the Galloping Canyon tonight, if the directions I got were accurate, after which the entrance to Zhanglian's vault itself should be a day or two away."

"So...", Crane began. "Just to make this clear... in order to pay for Master Tigress's dowry, we are going to a dungeon crawl?"

Shifu nodded. "Her dowry... and perhaps a new temple roof. We could really use a new roof."

"How does...", Mantis began. "How does that... gentleman... know that the vault exists, and where it is... when we have all been looking for it for centuries...?"

"Because he has visited it," his master responded matter-of-factly. "He was younger back then, of course, and spent a fair bit of time looking for it and cracking open its secrets. Unfortunately, its defenses proved too difficult for him, and so he shut the door and never returned, nor told about it to anyone."

"Ah." The other two nodded.

A pregnant pause. Finally, Shifu spoke again: "Students, you have had the opportunity to learn a very important lesson most of us can go decades before knowing it. Do you know what?"

A silence, as the crane and the mantis thought of this. "...Never start fights if you can avoid them?", Crane tried.

"...Be diplomatic...?", was Mantis's guess.

"Both good lessons," the red panda nodded and smiled, "but the one I was specifically talking about was this: every old bartender, innkeeper, shop owner and a landlord, is a retired kung fu master. No exceptions. So, try and be a little more careful about whom you get as an enemy."

"Even Mr. Ping?"

"_Especially_ Mr. Ping."

Nobody spoke again until evening, when they made camp right at the mouth of a vast, thin canyon between two mountains. The Galloping Canyons were named for the sound frequently made by the falling rocks, as they detached from the top and fell all the way to the bottom, hitting the walls and cliffs as they went: although the master slept peacefully, the two students felt strangely like a ghostly horse horde was just beyond their sight, and as such did not get too much rest.


	3. Trouble Back Home, Song That Bent Time

Far, far away from villages or tribes, where nobody had had any reason to come for decades - and several centuries more, before that one time decades ago with Master Crazy Horse - this was a region of Khangai Mountains utterly unmolested by civilization. A vast network of endless canyons and catacombs, where the sun did not shine even during midsummer, where it was forever cold and dark. 'Twas a place of serenity and calm, where nothing would ever come to disrupt the nature: other than the howling wind, and the haunting galloping sound emanated from the falling rocks, there was naught here but deep, endless silenc-

"YEAH, THERE ARE NO TURNS LEFT FOR THE NEXT TWENTY MILES AT LEAST," echoed a voice from somewhere far above, to be heard all across the area and making several rocks fall with the sound alone, "SO I AM PRETTY SURE WE SHOULD HAVE TAKEN THE TURN BEFORE."

"See, Master, I told you we should have taken the left turn," someone said from a cliffside, far below, rather more silently, before picking up the volume and yelling to the sky: "COULD YOU TAKE THAT TURN AND SEE WHAT'S AT THE END OF IT?"

"OKAY, I-"

"DON'T WORRY ABOUT IT," said a third voice. "THE VAULT COULD NOT BE SEEN FROM THE SKY, ANYWAY. AND BESIDES, I AM STILL SURE WE NEED TO TAKE THE TURN LATER."

"With respect, it doesn't look like you are reading that thing right. Let me see."

It is generally considered easier to travel in groups than alone, because that way you have someone to complain to and vent your frustration, or put the blame on somebody else when you are lost instead of admitting it was all your fault. And although Crazy Horse may have been the first person to enter these lands in centuries, this was the first time in that long time (plus several decades) that anyone could have heard any voices from here that were not the wind or rocks. The three bickering masters traversed the labyrinthine corridors of the Galloping Canyons, relying only on a map drawn by someone who might as well have had hooves for hands.

"See," Mantis pointed at it. "There are two turns left here... one ends up in a dead end, the other to our destination."

"But we have only seen one of the two," Shifu pointed out the obvious.

"Yes, but Crane scouted ahead and there is no other canyon, so we must've missed it, or it was just an error in the first place! So, I think we should go back and..."

"It is no error." Shifu tapped at a... well, to Mantis, by all appearances, it was a strange smudge in the paper between the two crossroads. "This is the Dragon Skull Rock. We should see it before the correct turn."

"Wait wait wait..." Mantis narrowed his eyes and looked at what was pointed at him, chirping. "Are you telling me that is a landmark? I thought it was just a bit of ink."

"Indeed." He looked up and around. "And you must have noticed that most of these canyons are pretty narrow, sometimes even tunnels from which you don't see daylight at all: it's not impossible for Crane to miss out one or two that're very important."

Looking closer, the ink did sort of have the shape of a dragon skull, with two holes to resemble eyes and such, but it was still rather a stretch. Indeed, the entire thing was very poorly drawn: it was basically just a bunch of squiggley lines to depict the circling passages of the canyons, a few more ink smudges that probably were all important landmarks after all, notes written in some of the poorest handwriting Mantis had ever seen, and several places where the author had just plain admitted he had forgotten the details, or made something up to make this place look like something a little more exciting. But he was, according to Shifu at least, still fairly certain about what the correct route was.

Some would have called the place beautiful, in its own rugged sort of way. To Mantis, it was plain boring. There was not a single sign of life, not even grass or trees, and the sun did not light or warm it up much even now that it was almost noon. Cold, grayish darkness everywhere, chilling wind hitting his face and threatening to blow him away, and talking about it with two other, increasingly more frustrated masters, all served to slowly but steadily chip on his admittedly vast reserve of patience.

And then Crane started to sing.

He went on about something like blazing a trail and changing myths into facts and something else, and Mantis, in an attempt to lock it all out, began to think about home and how the others were doing. Surely they could not have it this hard?

* * *

><p>Another needle pricked through her flesh and made her wince, prompting an apology from the pig lady fitting cloths over the larger female. Tigress reflected on how absurd it was that she could take a cannon blast to the chest without feeling it, but tiny needles used to fit a wedding dress and occasionally hitting her by accident would always be felt through and make her jump and wince.<p>

And as the other women harped on about how gorgeous she looked and how this was all going to be so much fun, how their whole families had come to check it all out, the to-be bride thought about her master, and two friends, who had had the excuse to go on an adventure, actually putting their skills to some use and having a good time. Certainly it was much easier and more fun for them than for her?

* * *

><p>"Quite unusual nowadays, virgin vistas, undefiled..."<p>

"Minds and bodies running wild..."

He was trying to tell Crane to shut up, but instead, somehow, the avian had managed to lead the other two masters into an impromptu singalong. This made being lost in an endless wasteland a much less tedious endeavor for them all, and-

Wait, wait a second. This isn't how it was supposed to... hold on...

* * *

><p>There we go.<p>

Tigress was not used to being at the center of the attention like this. Yes, there had been the whole Dragon Warrior tournament, but it was one thing to perform in front of a thousand spectators for a few hours, sharing the spotlight with four of her comrades, only to lose it all to a big, fat, wonderful panda that had crashed into her life from the heavens, proceeding to take not just the title that she thought belonged to her but also her heart, and...

She took a deep breath, managed to wipe the smile from her face, and continue on in a much more stoic matter. "But I digress. It is a completely different matter altogether to have a huge, weeks-long celebration involving more people than I can count, all dedicated to myself and the aforementioned panda. I have been doing martial arts for all my life, not prepared myself for social events of this level, and it all just popped in from around corner too. It's all a little overwhelming."

She finished up to the sympathetic Viper, as measurements were taken and pieces of expensive cloth finally removed, allowing her to return to the vest and pants she commonly wore. Dressing up to the outfit she had been wearing since she was a small kitten (well, not the exact same one, what with she growing up and needing a new one every now and then, but...) felt like she had come home from a long and treacherous journey across snowy mountains. "It's all right, everyone's going to feel like that when they're about to get married," her friend reassured her. "It's just the usual sort of jitters. You don't need to be a martial artist with no social skills to feel that way."

"I suppose... I still don't see why most women would think it to be the best day of their lives. I am just going to be happy to get it over with." She stretched up in her usual pants, kicking high up and catching her toes with her hand.

"Well, you'll get to have Po all for yourself!" Viper smiled happily.

"He was already all mine."

"Yes, but _officially!_ And you'll be the center of the attention, and everybody thinks you're awesome, and..."

The feline just sighed. "Well, it makes Master Shifu happy, I suppose. But honestly, I don't much care about all that, attention and the like. I did not become a kung fu master because of the fame." She made some more experimental kicks. "Why would I want to have the fanciest dress in town when I can't even kick in it? How am I supposed to fight?"

Viper tilted her head and gave the other a confused look. "...If all goes well, you're going to wear that dress precisely _once_ in your whole life, for one day."

As a response, the serpent got a long silence and a blank stare. "...And?", Tigress broke it. "Go on."

"Er..." She closed her eyes, shook her head, and tried to collect her words for a bit before continuing. "Tigress... if you are going to get in a fight in your own wedding, of all times, then... something has gone very, very wrong."

"Yes, but you admit it could be possible. I should be prepared for any event, however unlikely." She looked through the crate of dresses and outfits that had arrived in the room along with the pigs a little earlier, although completely ignoring a different package of perfumes and scents: they had spread all around the room already, filling it with a powerful aroma of flowers and such, and she would not have wished to add up anything to that. Instead, upon feeling around the clothes, her paws caught the sensation of something incredibly soft and silky, and she lifted them back up, along with another dress. She narrowed her eyes as she examined it.

"This doesn't look like a wedding dress..." Whereas the one they were planning for her appeared to be a long and formal, coloured in red and blue, this one was much shorter, revealing, and pink in colour, with a little gold here and there. Not looking like a wedding dress was an understatement: it could be easily said it did not look like anything to wear in public in any case.

"Yeeeah... that's because it isn't." Viper stared everywhere but her friend, swaying around a little bit, all in all embarrassed. "It's for the, you know... night after."

"...Oh." She nodded in a full understanding, then, largely on a whim, tried it on. It seemed to fit her well: truth be told, it made her feel like she was not wearing anything at all. ...Which was actually not that far from reality. It seemed a little chilly, but considering what sort of a situation it was for, this would probably not matter a fair bit anyway. She turned around, examined herself... then kicked, managing about as high up as she would have in her usual clothes - though also revealing a fair bit more fur to anyone present, which at the moment, perhaps thankfully, consisted of only Viper, who blushed.

"Much better."

"Would you stop measuring how high can you kick in those things? It's seriously the least of your problems."

"Even disregarding the possibility of an assassination attempt at our wedding night - which is admittedly not all that likely," she added after seeing Viper's face, "I just like to feel mobile and unrestrained."

"Well, yes, but-"

"Hey, what're you ladies yelling about in he-", said a third voice from the doorway.

The alleged ladies turned to address the other protagonist of the upcoming event, who appeared to having been passing by along the corridor with a stack of clothing in his arms. The stack fell down to the floor, the small thud it let out being the last sound anything made for several seconds, as he looked at Tigress, his jaw following the route the clothes had made and only stopped by being attached to the rest of his face. The rise of temperature could be intimately felt by everybody present.

"...Hi," Po finally managed, the single syllable being strained out from a dried throat.

"Hi," came the vastly eloquent and well-thought response.

"You look... nice."

"Thank you," she smiled. "So do... you." Po was wearing the usual cloth pants and sandals, although the clothes he carried around seemed to be vastly more stylish and high-quality, at least from whatever anyone could discern from their usual shape.

"That's...", he looked her up and down, pointing at what she was wearing, "...not your wedding dress... is it?"

"Yes. It uh, isn't." She smiled awkwardly. "I have no idea how it got there... then tried it on to see if it would fit, and... yeah, turns out it does."

"Right, right," he nodded knowingly, finally starting to pick up the stuff he had left on the ground. "So I've got a bit of time right now, I suppose you weren't g-" What he was saying turned into a short yelp as an invisible force behind the door picked up his hand and began to drag him away. Tigress was about to respond, when she too felt something wrap around her arm and pull her towards a side room, with someone going "Actually she's pretty busy right now we were just going to, er, try some more clothes!"

Po managed to grab the doorframe briefly and smile at her, going "See you later!", before he was once more and very decisively pulled away from her view. She immediately turned to the one responsible for her own dismissal. "Is there actually a reason for pulling me away like that?"

"Other than you wearing nothing but that... _thing?_", she responded with a hissing whisper.

"I was going to take it off!"

"That's even worse." She got a glare and wisely decided to not play that joke any longer. "Okay, but seriously, Master Shifu told us to..."

"...Try and keep you two from doing anything stupid until after the wedding, if you know what I mean," Monkey explained, "and we figured it'd be safest if you two didn't do much anything at all."

"What? Oh come on, I can't spend any time with the girl I'm going to, you know, _marry_ in about a week?", Po protested, spreading his hands and pretty much filling the entire hallway. "I just want to hang out with her for a bit. Is that really so much to ask?"

"There's no problem with just hanging out, but how do we know it'll stay just with that?" Monkey was giving him an almost pleading look.

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"Weeell," he continued, looking a little awkward, "from what we heard, you two were pretty busy over at the mountains before this all started... Master Shifu said you were like..."

Viper was interrupted with a *GAK!* when the feline, rather roughly, grabbed her throat and squeezed. "His words, not mine...!", she managed to wheeze.

"We can handle ourselves," Tigress said, loosening up a little but not letting her go entirely. The snake curled around her arm.

"Look, try and think this from our perspective, too. We were told by Master Shifu to keep an eye on you two, and if we fail..." Tigress could feel her entire body shudder. "I trained with him for over ten years before he became nice. Po isn't the only one here that could get Wuxi Finger Hold used on him."

Po gave an awkward, sad grin. "Yeah, well, I'm going to get of one too if I end up trying anything, so... you know. I can wait for a week if it'll save me my life."

"What about the mushrooms?", Monkey reminded almost mischievously.

"Hey, I'm still alive!"

"Barely. We told you you should have let them boil first, to get rid of the poison. It would have taken half an hour. But nooo, you had to eat them right away, said it would be no big deal..."

The panda sighed. "Look, I'll promise you, just one mushroom."

"Meaning...?"

"First base."

"No! No, no." The simian shook his head vigorously. "That's already too much. You're playing with fire here."

"What? I got all the way to second when we-" He was stopped by a simian hand reaching his mouth and silencing him. Monkey looked around to see if anyone else had heard anything (they hadn't), after which he put the hand on Po's shoulder and began leading him along the corridor.

"How about we talk about the exact terms on the way to the kitchen? I believe we were going to meet the newly-arrived chef." He managed to get the Dragon Groom to follow him without much of a trouble. "Find a compromise that'll let you get what you want while not make Master Shifu blow up anyone..."

Tigress casually tossed the cloth away, replacing it with her usual outfit once more, while Viper looked after, concerned. "Promise to be careful and not let him do like... well, like with the mushrooms? You remember the mushrooms, right?"

"I remember the mushrooms, and I promise to not let it go that far." She smiled genuinely, the first time in a couple days as much as Viper had seen. "I will try my best, for his own sake. Also..."

"Yes?"

"Do you think there are any others of those... dresses? For the night, I mean." There was a curious glimmer in her eye.

"Well, I'm not responsible for them, but... I guess? Why?"

"Oh, Po saw me in that one, so it won't surprise him anymore. I'll need something else." She grinned.

* * *

><p>Although neither Mr. Ping nor his son was particularly happy about the arrangement, it had been decided that the one doing the cooking for the event would be someone else than the two: being the groom, and his father, everybody else seemed to consider them far too important to handle such a lowly chore. Thankfully, Po had a replacement in mind.<p>

"Oh, you have no idea what an honour it is for me to have a chance to cook you again!" The small rabbit bowed so low he nearly hit his head to the stairs. "I thank you from the heart of myself AND my entire clan for seven generations!"

"Yes, yes, you're welcome, now let's not take this to that kind of an extreme..." He raised his hands in front of him defensively and managed a friendly, if somewhat strained, smile. "Just do your best, like the last time, and try to not get yourself killed. In fact, I am going to specifically order you to not commit a ritual suicide or to charge against a bandit army or anything, for any reason you might think of."

The sun had begun to set when they had caught up at the top end of the Jade Palace stairs. It was a nice, warm spring evening, with little wind and much beauty: Po was rather hoping on getting to spend some time with Tigress while he still could. "You have my word, Dragon Warrior, that I shall never fail you to such an extent," Wo Hop the chef proclaimed solemnly. "At worst, I may have to cut off an ear or both should I let something burn in the oven."

"Yeah..." Po's smile froze on his face, even as it was drained away from his eyes. "I'd really not like that either."

"Not even a little bit?" He sounded almost pleading.

"No, not even just a little bit. Look... how about instead of saying what you do if you fail me, you just, you know, _don't_ do that." The smile became somewhat more genuine again. "I called you in here for a reason: I know you won't mess things up, right?"

He gave that question, rhetoric as it was, perhaps a little bit too much time to think through for Po to feel entirely comfortable with, but in the end he managed to smile as well and nodded. "Let the heavens themselves bear witness to-"

He was cut off by a distant blast, almost like a thunder, from the fields right outside the Valley. This was an odd thing to be heard at the time because there was nary a cloud up in the sky, let alone an approaching storm. The iridescent object swiftly approaching likewise came as a surprise for them both, although a little less for the panda than the rabbit, as he had heard the use of such explosives before and knew what it meant.

The projectile went wide and struck a cliff next to the palace, exploding in fireworks and blowing apart chunks of rock. Long before it had come even that far, Po had used his own large body to protect the much smaller bunny chef, but the explosion was far enough that it ended up not mattering that much anyway. "What is going on?", Wo Hop inquired curiously, unaware of the danger. "Are those the fireworks for the party? They are rather strong... and early."

"Oh no, this seems like a different party." He began to usher the rabbit inside, with some geese helping out with his (extensive) luggage. "It's the kind of a party you're not invited, because frankly we don't need a chef there at all. Also you'll die. Find Zeng - he'll show you your room and kitchen - I kinda gotta go to deal with this thing..."

With their chef safely within the courtyard walls, or relatively so anyhow, Po wasted no time taking the stairs down to the Valley, mostly tiring himself out halfway through, stumbling, falling down for the rest of the way, before finally stopping at the end of it and being joined by the Furious Three. From the other way, that is, them having been much faster in getting down and consequently having the time to assess the situation before he got there at all. Tigress helped him up, but he thought he did a pretty good job at correcting himself afterward and making it look like he meant to do that in the first place. "What've we got?"

"Bandits," Viper responded succinctly. "With one of those Shen's fire-breathing, steel-spitting... er, that is to say, they have a Weapon."

"They don't seem to know how to aim it very well, though," Monkey observed.

"Right. Just _a _Weapon? As in, a single one, instead of a whole bunch like with Shen?"

"Just one," Tigress nodded. "But the bandits themselves appear to number in well over a thousand-"

"Wait, what?", Po interrupted. "How's there that many of them?"

"-And we are not in full strength," she finished before answering his question. "Perhaps that's the reason: they thought that we would be easy picking because we are missing three of our Masters, so they amassed a larger group and attacked with real force."

"Well, then!" He bounced at his place to loosen the muscles and prepare for the upcoming battle. "Better go there and show them how wrong they are in that! Send them home packing, wreck up the weapon, show them they still can't mess up with the Valley of P-" Another thunderous noise from afar prompted him to stop in his tracks. "Whoops, hold that thought, I gotta pick this one..."

* * *

><p>Usually bandits are small groups of a single predator species, looking to raid some food, supplies, or other sort of stuff that they are far too lazy or stupid to acuire legitimately, but thought themselves strong enough to take it from the others. This was not one of those groups: this was large, and much more varied. There were boars, bulls, crocodiles, wolves, even some horses, and of course, a single Weapon of the new age. The man in charge, a wolf, claimed being a survivor of the battle of Gongmen City, having salvaged the weapon and come here after hearing of how the Valley of Peace was in less than full strength.<p>

"Master Shifu is gone, as are two of the Furious Five!", he had rallied them with. "Now is our time to strike! Now is our time to claim what is ours by the right of the might! Now they will learn to fear us!" He was a reasonably good speaker, with a rare weapon of great power and value, and as such had acquired himself a command of a small army, which had now followed him here for conquest. They had been promised wealth and comfort that had been denied from them so far, for no legitimate reason whatsoever, out of simple mean-spiritedness of the animals and kung fu masters living here. There could be absolutely no other reason for that. Honest.

Everybody cheered when the Weapon fired for the first time with a deafening roar. The smell of black powder spread to the front, a brief rainbow light was seen, then it was gone. It did not lessen their good moods the slightest that it went wide: they had many more rounds with them, and judging from the size of the explosion, even a single one would be enough to destroy just about anything they would face. The aim was corrected and when the second one was fired, everybody present could see its trajectory being straight towards the Jade Palace, and would surely destroy it entirely and turn it into rubble! Right about... now!

...Now?

Confusion spread among the ranks when there was no blast at all. Had it been a dud? Had it missed the target after all and gone far up to the mountains?

No, there it is! Coming right back and... wait, that's not good.

"Oh, bolloc-" The blast of fire and sparkles struck straight to their boss and tore a large hole among their lines, spreading panic, discord, and fancy fireworks. Nobody had anticipated this: they had not been told the Valley had anything that could top what they had. They heard a scream that was not from one of them, saw the approaching shapes, knew this is where it would go down. It was on.

Their leader was gone, their ranks thinned, but they numbered in over a thousand regardless, and the Weapon was still intact: someone else took charge and another shot was fired straight towards the Dragon Warrior.

Or so it was aimed, anyway. An orange-black blur shot through them before anyone could do anything, and something growled from under the front of the metal thing, kicking upwards. It made a two-thirds spin in the air, pointing straight towards the bandits and giving them a whole half a second to realize what was going on, before it belched again and they knew of nothing except party colours. The weapon itself was kicked back by the recoil, before falling down with a resounding clank - on top of some other highly unfortunate invaders.

A fair bit of them realized that this was starting to suck. What they had hoped to be their greatest asset turned out to be nothing but a hindrance, and the four kung fu fighters remaining to protect the Valley wasted no time in smashing through them, tossing them around, and breaking their defense. But they outnumbered the enemy by almost three hundred to one still, and they knew they could overwhelm them by sheer weight of numbers.

They put up a good fight.

* * *

><p>"I told you it was a bad idea to block their escape route."<p>

"Stop talking."

"Here I'm like, Hey Tigress, maybe we should leave them a way out so that they could break and run instead of fighting as a last resort and going all berserk, but you're like We can't do that, otherwise they would come back and..."

"All right, I _get_ it, I messed up," she growled with her worst tone of voice, which shut Po up pretty well. She had been hurt fairly bad in the resulting last stand, and her mood was not improved by the fact that Viper was not as good with acupuncture as Mantis. She was bleeding from several minor cuts, had a broken leg, and there was an arrow lodged between her shoulderblades that nobody could pull out. Once he had initially made sure she was all right - and vice versa, the panda having taken his share of injuries - and after a reasonable amount of silence, he had once again brought up the idea he had thought in the battlefield yet dismissed by Tigress.

He sat next to her and tried his best to not wince when another needle was put into him. "Everybody makes mistakes," he attempted diplomatically.

She took a deep breath. "I know. But if they're wise, only once."

"You're pretty clever." he smiled at her.

"When I was a cub, I once chased a rabbit to a corner. At that age I just wanted someone to play with, and thought them running away from me was the part of the game, so I chased them. And then when I caught one, I thought now we could play, but instead he made a face, charged straight at me, and punched and clawed and bit. I fell down in surprise and pain - it was the first time I remember I actually got hurt of anything - and he took his chance and ran away." She looked away from him, eyes half-closed and much more sad than angry. "I made the same mistake now."

"So? Back then you couldn't have known cute bunnies are deadlier when in corner," the panda reasoned. "So you just learned that what you were doing wasn't really a game, and they were all afraid of you. So, same mistake but different lesson: that doesn't count!"

She looked somewhat doubtful, tensing briefly when a needle was put in her before answering: "It was still a stupid mistake to make. I should have known better."

"Yeah, like I said, mistakes happen. Even if just once."

The next few minutes were spent in silence, letting Viper do her acupuncture thing. She tried to get the arrow out by relaxing the chi around the wound with some more needles, but the only result was that those were stuck in too.

"...You know, you can be pretty wise when you try." Tigress smiled again.

"I should write a book," he suggested jokingly. "About, like, how to fight. Stuff like giving the enemy an escape route so that they become panicked and won't go crazy on you, or the guy that wins every fights is worse than a guy that wins without fighting, or how personal attachments are good because they make for better teamwork."

"I think those are all good ideas."

"Yeah!" He smiled. "Personal attachments make people fight better! I mean, remember how right at the beginning you hated my guts? You wouldn't have pounced at those boars trying to stab me like that, no, you probably would've just let me die - or at least not take so much effort in saving me."

"Don't remind me," she shruddered.

On the bright side, they did get to watch the sunset in the end after all, holding hands. The only things he hadn't foreseen were that Viper was there to fuss over them, and Tigress had an arrow in her back. But the distant horizon looked like it was on fire, and slowly, like that one time a while ago, the rest of the world, along with their physical injuries, just sort of faded away. Viper complained when he put his hand over her shoulders, made some token effort in acupuncture, then just decided to leave and let the two have a bit of peace.

"Were you seriously thinking about writing a book?", Tigress murmured as she curled up against him.

"Meh. No one would read it anyway." She began to purr as he scratched her from behind her ear, and slowly put her head against his big, soft, fuzzy belly.

* * *

><p>Thousands of miles north, Master Shifu shuddered heavily.<p>

"Yeah, it's pretty cold here," Crane agreed, ruffling his feathers and watching the stone double-doors in front of them. It seemed to be the source of the cold mist in the cave, so different from the summer warmth (even the relative warmth of the canyons above): the lantern carried by the group avian gave them very little light to see in the dark, and even less warmth to fight the cold. The door was very slightly ajar, and from within, the coldest winter seeped through.

The Dragon Skull Rock (which had actually looked like one, unlike the stain in the map) had been found eventually, after which the correct route was easy enough to notice: itwas a cave instead of canyon, which is why Crane had not seen it first. And although nobody involved was very eager in admitting it, in that it did not really make any sense to anyone there at all, somehow, the entire bit about singing had made the rest of the journey go faster. They were reasonably certain they had been on the road for another couple days, while the song itself was only a few minutes long, yet there were no repeats and they were still here by the time it ended. It was rather as if time had bent to their advantage.

"Hey Crane," Mantis said as he accompanied the red panda to the door, to help him open it for the rest of them to go through (the insect could fit past the crack just fine). "You know all those stories about what lies beneath? The corpse of Zhanglian Khan, stone warriors, and all that?"

"What about them?"

As the door was opened further, enough to allow all three entrance, the cave they were in became even colder, and a strange, faint howling was heard within. Mantis took the lead, being the first to enter the doorway in several decades - or several centuries, if Master Crazy Horse didn't count. "Bet you five gold pieces they're all true."


	4. The Vault of Zhanglian Khan

Sun was setting in Mongolia, ending the cool day and bringing in an even colder night. Not that there was anything up here to experience it: the only living thing in these mountains was down below, and none of them much cared about the positions of the celestial objects at the moment anyway.

It was pretty darn cold, whether the sun was up or not, where its light never reached.

From beyond the mist, the lantern light bathing their face in gold after decades of darkness, emerged a group of large warriors, guardians of this vault. They looked so real that the three masters nearly took their battle stances before they saw that the enemy was, indeed, made of stone, and would not make a move against them. All horses, they appeared to wear simple armor and wield spears or hammers, each a unique individual with his own size, shape, mane, and face. Unmoving stone eyes staring into nothingness, placed to both sides of the tunnel.

Mantis seemed somewhat happier than it may have been appropriate down here, but Crane was more impassive and reminded his fellow master of such: "Don't count your coins yet: the stories also say they _move._"

Indeed, these did not. They appeared to pay no heed whatsoever to the intruders walking past them, further into the cold darkness.

They found some unused torches, and upon lighting them up, were mercifully granted some extra light to look around with, albeit it being still very, very cold. It was a narrow stone passage, carved rather than natural, with tales of adventure and conquest engraved on the walls. They told their own story of the "weaklings of China, that deserved to be trampled down by true strength," as well as the great demons of the Demon Valley, each capable of single-handedly destroying a horde of conquerors, "nine tenths of us falling, the rest fleeing for their lives from the fury of these beasts."

Master Oogway himself, as they saw, was given special attention. The great battle between himself and Zhanglian Khan covered an entire wall: it depicted a clearly demonic and villainous turtle, utilizing black magics and demonic forces, triumphing over the horse conqueror, who was depicted as a large, handsome, and heroic figure. "And so our lord and champion fell in battle against this creature of great evil, but he was not truly dead, for we brought him here, to the secret temple he had built for himself, and performed ancient rites so that he could one day **I SEE YOU**"

Crane, who was reading the text, was taken by surprise and had nary a half of a second to dodge the sudden blast of cold, breathed by the stone engraving of the great Khan. Even being in the proximity of the trap was enough to make him shiver: the opposite wall, taking the full brunt of the chill, was instantly covered with ice and frost. The other two turned to look at him as they all heard, from down below, a vast rumbling sound.

"Crane, what did you just do?", Shifu inquired in alarm.

"Nothing!", the student responded. "I just read at this thing here, and then suddenly it..."

He trailed off as the wind from down below, once again, brought the howling. It sounded like it was saying something, but none of them could discern what it was, and soon both it and the rumbling ceased, returning the place to silence once again. The torches were nearly extinguished before the gust died out a little, back to the level it used to be, though never went away entirely. And they could all swear it had become colder.

"How can it be so cold down here, anyway?", Mantis wondered. "You'd think it'd be warmer than up there."

"Dark forces are afoot," Shifu noted grimly, as he limped on along the passage. "Let's move on. I don't think any of us want to spend any longer here than it is absolutely necessary..."

"Did that count as a trap?", Mantis asked Crane, pointing at the mouth of the horse, that had blown the cold blast a minute earlier. The avian just shrugged: "Let's wait for a couple more first."

They needn't wait for long. The pathway soon began to descend, and circle, in an ancient staircase that took them even further below into the abyss of the accursed vaults. The torches fluttered in the wind and painted strange, dancing shapes to the walls, oddly like the shadows of galloping horse warriors, or so they thought.

It felt to them all that they were expected now, though by what, they did not like to think about. The wind would still occasionally bring up voices - clatter, rumbling, cackles, neighs... - although for the most part it was, mercifully enough, silent.

Next, just a little bit after the staircase had stopped and they were in a corridor once more, the clatter came from somewhere much closer, and a sound of drawn steel. "Ooh, I wonder what that means...?", Mantis asked, though all of them could very easily guess. He just figured this was a step closer to winning a bet.

Besides, the skeletons of many animals littering the entire hallway told their own message.

A loud whoosh followed as the pole, with a large blade at the end of it, swung down from the ceiling and towards the masters. Meant for a man much larger than him, Mantis needn't even dodge, just letting it fly above his head: Crane and Shifu were of the correct size, meanwhile, but also much too fast and skilled to be hit. It just went past them and a while more before stopping, the forces of gravity conspiring to turn it back for another go.

"That counts!", the insect continued, and Crane admitted him in being correct. "All right, the vain and paranoid warlord put some traps to defend his treasure," he stated matter-of-factly as he dodged another blade. "Well predicted."

There were many more, but none would deter Master Shifu now that he had actually bothered himself to come this far. He skillfully evaded the many swinging blades, jumping and flipping and moving past as if they were not there at all. The floor and the walls were full of holes, from which more cold steam blew at him, along with arrows and spears, but even as one murderhole would bring out its deadly gifts, he was already like three holes ahead. Spiked pits were no issue whatsoever as long as he had Oogway's staff to stand on: it was thrice as long as any spike down there. Beartraps and banana peels were abundant, but not difficult to sidestep once they knew where they were.

Zhanglian Khan was clearly a very thorough man, but clearly not enough so to kill the three masters. "It's just like back in the training hall!", Crane exclaimed, almost nostalgic, as he stepped aside from a razor-sharp spinning blade, briefly appearing from a tiny crack in the wall, in an effort to cut something soft and fleshy, before going right back to hiding, disappointed.

The pathway widened soon after, until they could no longer see the walls on their left or right side, nor the ceiling. Indeed, even the floor itself disappeared in front of them, replaced by a massive stone staircase, heading down. Naturally, after the experience in the corridor, none of them stepped on it without expecting another trap - and as such were not disappointed when it suddenly vanished, with a heavy clack, turning into a slippery slide down into the abyss. Full of more spinning blades, of course.

Crane was the first one down, on account of flying, and lit up the bottom of the this time quite natural cave, as well as the strange lump in the darkness, for the other two. "Hey, I think I found something..."

Upon closer examination, it appeared to be a large headless corpse, dressed in ancient, ragged robes. Its flesh and skin had long since decayed, leaving nothing but old bones, bleached white as snow. An explorer, not unlike the three of them, that had clearly been to the staircase as well but performed less admirably, possibly blaming his much larger size, no smaller than a horse.

"Master Charging Rhino!", Shifu exclaimed. "So he did find the vault, after all. But where is his...?"

"Found it," Mantis chirped in, ten feet away from the rest of the body, nudging a skeletal head of a rhino. "Whatever got him, got him real well."

"I did not mean his head," Shifu said as he searched the corpse. "I was talking about... aha!" He smiled as he picked up and lifted what was, or so it appeared anyway, a short wooden stick, less than a foot long. But upon tweaking its end a little, it suddenly extended into almost twice the length of an average rhino, with a steel blade in one end.

"Is that the Collapsible Spear of Glory?", Crane asked carefully, watching the thing unfold, and then fold again as Shifu tweaked it another time. "It has been lost for centuries!"

"And now, it has been found!" He pocketed the rod, and turned to watch at the body solemnly, even as Mantis returned its head to its rough position. "Master Charging Rhino took it with him when he left to search for the vault: its recovery, and that of his body if we have the chance to take it with us too, will make this journey worthwhile all by itself."

They were in a large cave now, but it had more torches to light up, and they soon improved their visibility within a great deal. And as more and more light sources illuminated the area, they revealed an astonishing sight indeed: before them, numbering thousands and filling the entire hall, were statues, like the few they had seen by the door. Again, most were horses, although they could see some bulls, rhinos, and other large creatures among them - all distinctive and unique. It was like an entire army of stone was keeping this place as its headquarters.

"Suddenly," Mantis began, as they moved amongst the silent guardians, to reach the other side, "I don't feel like I might want to win the bet anymore."

He received no answer, and soon the vault descended back into silence, only an occasional footstep or staff hitting the ground being heard, echoing almost unnaturally all over. They could not see the other end, even if they lit up more torches and other light sources as they went, so vast was this place, so full of statues. They were in a very good shape, and their eyes seemed almost like full of life... almost following the three masters with their gaze, as they passed.

And even now the temperature continued to descend, the cold fog covering the ground throughout, and a gentle, if similarly chilling wind constantly blew at them from an unknown source, though it carried no voices with it this time.

Finally, after a much longer walk than they had anticipated, the end of the vast stone army came to an end. Here there was another staircase, heading up this time, and much longer than the last one. There were torches lined up on both sides: as Mantis moved on to light up one, the others instantly flared into life as well, bathing the entire pathway in a dim play of light and shadows. Crane took flight once more, reaching the top before the rest of them, whereas Masters Shifu and Mantis both ascended on foot, taking great care for any more traps or other tricks.

Surprisingly, there were none.

Once again, Crane was the first to reach the end of it, fly his way to the summit of this great staircase, but this time around, he did not call for the rest of them. Indeed, he would not respond at all until Shifu, concerned, called for him. "Master Crane!"

"I am here," he calmly answered. "This is quite a sight... come and check it out."

Crane saw gold. Wherever the light of his lamp hit, it was reflected away by the vast piles of treasure, veritable mountains of riches stolen from China all those centuries ago. Once again, he could not see the end of them, the large majority of the entire room cast in shadows. Shifu and Mantis reached up soon after, lighting more with their torches, revealing more gold and gems to glimmer back at them.

"Impressive...", Shifu gasped. "This is truly all, and more, we have read about this place existing."

"I would say it would count as mountains," Mantis added. "Would you, Crane?"

"I suppose," the bird conceded. "You have this one. There's way more than we could carry, anyway."

"Yes, but I doubt we need that much for Master Tigress," Shifu added, taking out his sack. "Let's take what we can, then head back home. We can always come back again, with a larger force, to claim the rest."

The others agreed, and it took them no time whatsoever to fill all their bags and containers with gold and jewelry, initially ill-earned and now being returned to China. Both Crane and Shifu made a preference over gems, rings, and other items of historical or artistic value, rather than just plain gold. Mantis, who had no sack of his own, instead took his time to explore the vault further, investigate the furthest reaches where their torchlight had not carried before.

Minutes later, his voice echoed across the halls: "Uh... guys! You might want to come over here for a bit."

When they did, they found him standing on the edge of a large stone coffin, hidden between many piles of gold. He was looking down inside.

There, within, lay the body of a massive horse indeed. He must have been a strong and muscular one in life, visible even now that all had decayed away but his skeleton. He may have been wrapped in burial shrouds when he first had died, but those had likewise long since rotted, leaving him bare. On top of him, gripped by both hands, there was a large stone hammer, almost a maul, adorned with runes of power. 'Twas the final resting place of the great Khan, and though he was long deceased and clearly harmless, he struck everybody with concern and doubt - certainly so much more than he would have when he was alive.

There was no mist within the casket, although it surrounded it entirely from all sides. The wind had died out: whatever voices it used to carry with it earlier, ceased. For a good while, the three masters merely regarded the body, and each other, and the treasure piles, wordlessly. Tension was mounting up in silence.

"So he really was found and buried here...", Mantis muttered. "Interesting."

"But creepy," Crane added.

"This is no vault at all," Shifu stated matter-of-factly. "This is a tomb. Stolen as this treasure may be, it really would be for the best if we did not tarry any longer than we absolutely have to."

"Here's an idea," Crane began with faked cheer. "How about we left right now?"

The others heartily agreed. But even as they turned away to make their way out of this place, a loud crash carried to their ears from whence they had come... rumbling, clatter of weapons, and then, what sounded horribly like marching. And not merely a small force, but thousands, perhaps tens of. All coming at their direction. "...You have _got_ to be kidding me," Crane moaned.

Whoever he thought might have been kidding, clearly was not. Mere minute later, the first lines of the stone warriors marched into sight, weapons at the ready, preparing to confront the intruders. They said nothing, nor shouted battle cries, but rather simply approached without a word, making no other noise than the thundering of their feet, marching in unison.

"Here we are, then," Crane sighed, and dejectedly took a battle-stance. "This really is going to suck, isn't it?"

"More so if we do not fight: prepare yourself!" Shifu was the first to attack, Oogway's cane striking straight through stone and piercing the head of the first in line. It crumbled down, lifeless.

More and more came after the first, the endless stone hordes being thrown at the three by an invisible mystical force. Two spears were thrusted at Crane, but although these stone creatures were many, they were still not flesh, not alive, and their movements were slow and clumsy - trivial to avoid even for someone that was not a kung fu master, and easy to counterattack for someone that was. Stone shattered and heavy bodies were kicked back.

"This reminds me of the battle of the Weeping River!", Mantis exclaimed, even as he charged to the the enemy ranks, kicking into stone and breaking sculpted faces. They were not deterred, attempting to surround him and run him through with their spears, but Shifu and Crane were soon there to support him, pushing back the enemy lines.

A blast of green light struck through one stone warrior, as Shifu broke it with a powerful burst of chi. Its pieces and rubble were thrown behind and everywhere. "Only this time we are not at full strength," he responded to Mantis, "and the enemy numbers are all the bigger. The situation is growing dire."

"We need to get out." Crane kicked two soldiers aside from him, then spread his wings. "Both of you, grab on my feet and hold o-"

**"THIEVES..."**

Everything froze. If it was still possible that the air could become even colder, it did. The voice echoed from behind like a ghostly wail from beyond death, carrying with it a prospect of doom in the hands of that who was not supposed to be in any shape to deliver it anymore. The statues stopped attacking and stepped back, apparently in reverence, whereas the three intruders ceased hostilities more because of utter disbelief and shock. "Impossible," Shifu muttered.

From the very edge of their field of vision, at the back of the vault, a shape slowly made its way out of its stone casket. It was easy to see in spite of being back there, and being covered in mist, for it was a large thing, and it had two small sources of red glow from top of it, unmistakeably eyes. It walked slowly towards them, wielding a hammer on its hand, even the gold and gems all around them developing frost as the temperature continued to decrease.

Zhanglian Khan stepped fully into their sights, regarding them with a cold in his red eyes, breathing freezing mist, each snort of anger bursting a small cloud that stiffened their flesh with frost. When he spoke, his voice echoed across the vault like a thunder, the tone cold like from the grave: **"Who are ye... that walk in my hall, as if it were... thine home? Stealing... my treasure? Accursed thieves...!"**

Mantis was the first to recover from the surprise of being addressed by a dead person. "Hey, you stole from us first!"

Even as they conversed, the statue warriors kept their distance but arranged themselves around the three, to surround them. All the masters maintained their battle positions. The Khan breathed in and out, seeming to be in contemplation, before answering: **"...So... you come from the land... of cowards, weaklings, and... dark wizards...? I merely took thine wealth... for you were too weak to hold it yourself... I was in the right to take it...!"**

"But then, by the same logic, couldn't we just take your stuff as well?", Crane pointed out. "Since it just means you were too weak to hold on to it..."

And this time, cutting off the last part of the avian's argument, the long-dead conqueror actually laughed. Perhaps, one day in the past, it could have been a hearty, amused chuckle, right now it was downright uncanny, bringing goosebumps to their flesh and bristling their fur. **"Ye regard yourself as strong enough... to steal from me, the great Zhanglian Khan...? Show me... then... how shall ye just take my wealth and... leave...!"**

He had barely had the time to end his sentence before the statues once again flared to life, and advanced, even as their commander stepped back to let his lackeys perform the execution. Spears harried them from all directions, but neither Crane nor Mantis were there anymore, one having gone above, the other below: even as the latter punched and kicked their feet, forcing them to turn their weapons at him instead of pointing them towards the threat from the air, the former seized the opportunity to dive in without being skewered, squashing stone flat against the ground. Living statues were kicked aside, above, and to all other directions, spears and hammers split in twain or more parts.

Those choosing to engage Master Shifu instead were doing little better. Be it one, six, or score spears thrust at him at once, the tar-like and mechanical attacks were much too slow to have any hope to hit the red panda: where a spear came, there was but air. Where a hammer fell, it instead struck the face of a comrade, the old master having moved on long since. Many fell.

But although this was the usual strategy employed by him, simply throwing in bodies until the enemy fell, the great Khan did have a rudimentary sense of tactics. Upon seeing that this would take rather long and cost him many men - unliving as they might have been - a single word was uttered, and his forces backed away.

"What did he just say?", Mantis asked. "I didn't quite hear."

"I think it was 'archers'," responded Crane.

"Oh. Well, that's no good."

As two ranks of statues spread apart and got out of the way, they revealed a number of warriors armed with crude bows, and quivers full of arrows, taking aim. A volley was fired at Shifu, another towards Crane, and although most of them naturally missed, or were deflected, it would not be all: Crane was dropped from the sky into the midst of them, from which great sounds of battle were soon heard as statues flew out in many pieces. Afterwards, the archers never had the chance for another shot before Mantis was right at the rest, kicking them aside and apart. They attempted to retreat again, clearing the field for more bows, but their enemy knew better now and would not give them the chance: Mantis was faster than them by a fair bit, as was Crane - even with an arrow sticking out of his wing - and could easily keep up with the speed.

A number more were taking aim at Shifu again, who had received no worse than grazes from the last one, but they were thwarted by one of their own being thrown at them at a high speed, crushing two of them in the resulting shockwave - swiftly followed by a kung fu master throwing himself into the fray at an even higher velocity, intent on prodding a wooden staff through their eyes, breaking whatever magic was allowing them to move. Even if he had not the time or momentum to break every statue on his way, he at least did his best to shatter their weapons instead, rendering them harmless nonetheless. Those were the lucky ones: the unlucky individuals were directly on his way, and leisurely kicked asunder.

But even then, it was nothing but prolonging the inevitable, no better than a fly fighting off an avalanche: even as hundreds of the statue warriors fell, there were always more to take their place, thousands upon thousands. Even now, they were being worn out, slow but steady, and they could never withstand against the entire mass of the enemy and emerge victorious: they would tire before that, and make a fatal mistake.

Even in his old age, Master Shifu was a great master. And though he was facing many, many foes, they were largely unworthy of his attention. They could not even surprise him, let alone actually touch him, not until he would wear himself out, which would not happen in a while yet. But Zhanglian Khan himself was another matter entirely: when the old red panda turned around to face the next attacker that had tried to catch him off-guard, he saw no slow statue, but rather the undead emperor, who had apparently crossed a fair bit of distance in a very short time. And perhaps even more importantly, he saw the hammer quickly approaching his face.

The quick flash of intense pain against his skull, throwing him back into the floor, was the last thing he felt before he lost his senses and consciousness, even if for but a brief moment.

* * *

><p>Cold.<p>

That was his first thought when he came to, his mind at least halfway functional once more. It was so very cold. The ground under his hand felt frozen as he tried to push himself upright, to continue the battle, to survive. Howling winds passed through him and pierced into the marrow of his old bones, feeding on whatever remained of his will to go on, to fight, threatening to have him fall back down and not get up again. His head ached, everything his eyes saw was blur, no matter how he tried to concentrate on the moving shapes around him. A voice echoed through his ears, like it came from somewhere far away. It felt vaguely familiar, though he could not really concentrate on exactly who it sounded like, and had an alarmed, warning sound: "Master!"

He managed to turn his head to his right, upwards from the floor, and saw the swiftly approaching shape of a vast stone hammer, aimed at his head. Who wielded that hammer, he could not see from all the blur, nor could he entirely remember either. But he did remember something clearly, nonetheless: _why _he was here, and _who_ it was that he was here for. If there had been the time for it, if the hammer would have come a second or two later, he would have groaned in deep exasperation and annoyance.

The things he did for his daughter...

* * *

><p>Above, the one wielding the hammer, an undead being of great power, his face decayed away but his eyes still full of hatred and rage. Below, the target of the weapon's trajectory, its wielder's attentions, an old man of surprising calmness considering his situation. His eyes were closed, and his breath deep and serene.<p>

A hand rose up to meet the hammer.

_Inner peace._

The weapon had none of the effect anyone present, apart from Master Shifu perhaps, had anticipated. Instead of breaking apart the hand opposing it, and the person owning the hand, the hammer was stopped in its tracks by the small hand with its frail fingers. Master Crane, worried over the life of his own teacher, sighed in relief and nonchalantly kicked aside another statue that was trying to strike him, breaking its head in pieces. "You know, I get the feeling I really should learn that," Mantis noted.

The hammer swung around once, from its tip, and so did the one that allegedly wielded the thing, picking up speed before being tossed to the ceiling, screaming.

"You couldn't," Crane simply responded.

Even as they watched, Shifu flipped the hammer around and wielded its haft, swung around one more time, and threw it up as well. There was a loud clang, and crash, from up above.

Seconds after, something big fell down, followed by a fair amount of rocks.

At last, after many centuries, the great Khan had gone to true peace. His physical remains had fallen somewhere behind the first ranks of the men of stone, buried under land and boulders that his body and the hammer had dislodged. With him gone, the remaining thousands of the unliving warriors fell silent, and stopped their relentless assault, finally giving the three masters some peace: perhaps it had been Zhanglian Khan's undead influence that kept them moving to begin with?

"That's good," Mantis said.

Silence fell once again, but persisted mere seconds only before more began to fall with a loud rumble. Was his presence why this place could exist, too? Or was it simply that the impact suffered by the ceiling was a great deal more serious than anyone had thought it would? Whatever the reason, it was to their alarm that more rocks began falling down, from little pebbles to vast boulders. The entire chamber shook, a sudden earthquake striking into the hapless cave, determined to collapse it entirely.

"That's bad," Mantis said.

In retrospect, upon mulling the common tropes and events regarding underground lairs with evil supernatural inhabitants, this outcome was a virtual certainty. Crane made sure Shifu was all right, and to his relief found that such was the case. "We need to leave right away," he declared, "before we are also buried here!" More stone fell to enforce his decision, but while he and Crane prepared to leave, Mantis instead headed back to the end of the place.

"Just give me one second!", he called to them. "I want to check on something I saw."

Even as the piles of treasure crumbled down, the other two followed him to see just what he was up to, and found him jumping on the casket, then not inside it, but behind it. A second later he returned, carrying a small and ornate box, smiling even as more rocks fell.

"What could there be that made this worth it?", Crane asked even as they all fled to the trapped hallway, which was also collapsing. Thankfully, this had made most of the traps defunct, not that they would have had too much trouble evading them anyhow.

"The greatest treasure in the world!", the insect responded even as he dodged a falling blade trap. "This was hidden separately from everything else, and put in a fancy box! It's definitely it!"

"Would you two just stop it with that bet already?", Shifu exclaimed exasperated, ducking as a flying sawblade went over his head and nearly took off a half of his ears. "It was stupid to begin with!"

"Well, yes, but don't you think, Master, that Zhanglian Khan's greatest treasure would not be an interesting thing to find out about anyway?", Mantis pointed out.

"Not interesting enough to die for! Let's just focus on getting out of here in one piece, and _then_ we may perhaps open your mystery box!"

This was still easier said than done, given the circumstances: there was very little room for them to maneuver in the corridor, and though the traps were not functional anymore for the most part, they instead had to deal with the problem of falling rock and boulders. Oftentimes they had to stop and smash them out of their way, so cramped had the way become that even Mantis had trouble getting through.

Worse still, they soon found that the spiral staircase had collapsed, and Crane was not yet capable of flight, thanks to the arrow. A kung fu master's body is capable of very rapid healing, thanks to the powerful chi reserves enhancing their physical shell in all ways, but even that technique could only heal so fast: it had its limits, and three minutes was far too little. He was not much of a jumper or climber, but he would now have to adapt to the situation and try his best: thankfully, he had two much more agile leapers there to help him up.

Unfortunately, there were not many stepping stones in the forms of falling rocks, meaning they had to find other, less awesome ways to get up. Such as just plain climbing.

Naturally, the very last tunnel was also the one that had practically collapsed entirely. There was just barely enough room for them all to crawl through, and they had to do so while being afraid of a horrible crushing death. Thankfully, they had Mantis with them to keep the entire thing up until everybody had gotten through. And likewise thankfully, as soon as they had gotten past it, they found that the door itself was entirely intact, and that the caves after it were largely smooth sailing.

It was dead at night outside, and, in comparison to the underworld, strangely warm. Now that the constant threat of dying had finally gone away, them no longer needing to run or fight in order to stay alive, the adrenaline rush going away and replacing with a warm and rather pleasant shudder of weariness all throughout their muscles, all three instantly collapsed to the ground and did not move for a good while.

Crane began to laugh, partly out of the sheer joy of being alive, but mostly for no reason whatsoever, starting with just a low chuckle but eventually ending as a loud cackle of madness. "Have you gone completely insane?", Mantis asked.

"I don't know..." He wiped tears out of his eyes. "Maybe?"

They were not entirely sure how long they spent just lying there. It was likely they fell asleep at some moment or another, for when they once again perceived their surroundings, it was morning. Every place ached: they were full of bruises, cuts, broken bones, arrow-wounds, and warts. "I should have brought my needles," Mantis moaned, as he stretched and rubbed his back.

But as much pain as there had been involved, they had gotten out with two sacks full of treasure, a long-lost ancient relic, and a hitherto sealed box that promised to have the greatest of them all. To these they now turned their attention, with little else to turn it to anyway. "Our efforts, I think," Shifu began, "have not gone in vain: these should be more than enough to pay for the dowry, _and_ the wedding, in its entirety!"

"And the palace roof," Crane added.

"And the palace roof," Mantis agreed.

It was Shifu who first remembered the box. "So, what could be inside this thing, anyway?", he wondered, holding it in his hands and turning it around. "What would be the most valued treasure of a world-conquering warlord?"

The other two gathered around the item as well, eyeing it. "Obviously it was some great and valuable gem," Mantis guessed.

"No no, a magical charm of luck!", Crane exclaimed. "How else could he have managed so far into China?"

The opening of the box was a far more solemn event than it may have had any right to be. The removal of the seals, then the act of pulling the lid, both took longer than they should have and with much more festivity. Finally, the way was clear for three pairs of eyes to look within, see what had caused such a fuss before, and what was revealed to them was...

Mantis groaned. "Out of all bloody things..."

For what they saw was, in fact, their own faces, reflected from a very ornate and well-made silver mirror. It was a very well-preserved and flawless work of art, with not a single fracture, and lined with what appeared to be runed ebony. From the reflection, they observed their own weariness and wrinkles under their eyes, and watched each other blink and frown.

"Oh, now I finally understand!", Crane mocked. "We came all this way to find a dowry for Master Tigress, and yet we never realized, the dowry was in our _hearts_ all along!"

"I really would not have expected Zhanglian Khan to understand this kind of matters," Shifu added, puzzled, "what with all the conquering and such matters."

"Well, the stories _did_ say he was also incredibly vain." Mantis shrugged. "Maybe he just liked looking at his own face?"

"That works," said Crane, flexing his wing and preparing to take flight towards home, but was stopped by Mantis.

"Aren't you forgetting something...?"

"...What?"

"Our bet." He seemed pretty happy, probably less because of the money and more because of the sheer joy of one-upping his friend. "Piles of treasure, stone warriors, vicious traps, the great Khan's body, his Greatest Treasure ever... we saw them all!"

"No, we did not," Crane pointed out. "We never found the voodoo doll, now did we?"

Mantis's face fell. "Oh come on, that was, like, one story, ever!"

"It still counts." It was as if the smile had jumped from the insect's face and onto the avian's. "But thank you for reminding me: I believe you owe me five gold pieces."

By the time Mantis grudgingly paid him the money, and he took off with the other one hanging from his leg, Shifu was already far off. Frankly, after all the stuff he had been through, he thought it would be reasonable that he wanted to go home as soon as possible, take a long bath, then attend to the wedding of his adopted daughter.


End file.
